Chapter Text
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One of Leonardo's favorite pastimes was sitting on top of the roof's lair and laying back against the clock, watching as the stars moved across the night-sky, illuminating earth with just enough light for there to be proper visibility.
The city below him was bustling with humans and traffic, the glowing street lights and lamps adding to the surrealness of the moment.
He leaned back slightly, taking in the vastness above, his usual stoic expression softened by the serenity of the moment. The cool breeze tugged at the edges of his black and red bandana, but he didn’t mind.
There was a rare kind of peace up here, it was a nice change in scenery from the constant fighting and strategizing of his everyday life. For a brief moment, Leo allowed himself to breathe, to feel the weight of the stars above, distant and indifferent yet comforting in their quiet presence.
For a while, he simply sat there, lost in thought, his mind wandering between memories of past missions, training, and the endless responsibilities he carried. The calm of the night gave him room to reflect, time where he could be at peace with himself. The weight of being one of Shredder's top warriors, striving to be perfect, the best he could be, the decision maker — without proper management, was crushing. .
A soft sigh escaped him as he slowly sat up, reaching for his katana. He knew the peace wouldn’t last forever. The world below was always waiting. Which is why he jumped down from the roof, landing perfectly on his feet and entering his home.
He had no reason to speak with his sensei, so instead he went to his room to change — it was late anyways, he needed to sleep, especially since Shredder had mentioned he had big news to tell him and Karai the following evening.
Once he arrived at his door, he opened it softly and walked inside after locking it and set his katanas neatly on his wall. Leonardo turned towards the mirror hanging from his door and took a second to observe himself — He was wearing a black bandana, only the end tips being a dark red, his entire gear was fully black, even the fishnets he wore wrapped around his arms with gloves remained in the same color palette.
Karai liked to say Leonardo looked like a child's first dress up after going to a hot topic for the first time, which till this day he failed to understand. The turtle sighed and sat on his bed, carefully removing the extra dark grey chains he had wrapped around his thighs, then moved up to his arms, removing his fishnets, discarding them neatly to the side.
He removed all of his gear, setting it down in a nearby corner, then removed his belt with the shredder's symbol on it and held it in his hand. He, Karai and Shredder all shared the matching symbol and Leo couldn’t help but crack a smile — it made him feel special for some odd reason. Leo put it with the rest of his gear before taking off his bandana and setting it on his night stand.
Leonardo laid back on his bed and the tension in his muscles lessened as he let himself sink into one of the few comforts he had. Training today had been brutal even if he had come out victorious as usual — being in Shredders ‘elite’ squad was
not
easy.
From what Leo remembered, he, Karai, Bradford who still came around often, and someone else Leo didn’t know made up the elite squad. From time to time Leo wondered who that other person was and Karai refused to speak about it.
Everytime he asked who, Karai would only sigh and say, “I don't want to get my hopes up,” and end the conversation. Karai rarely kept things from him, so it had to be serious. All the turtle knew was that this mysterious person lives and trains in Japan at the foot's regular headquarters and takes care of everything there — which only made him even more curious.
Shredder had mentioned a few times that the person runs a lot of things at the other headquarters to keep everything in check while he’s away, which means that they must be even better than Leo and Karai; more disciplined, better skills, the list goes on.
Despite not knowing the person, his admiration for them only grew based on his own speculations, but he knew it to be true because the one thing Shredder would not do is put an incompetent person to run the foot clan.
Maybe one day he would meet them.
The unmasked turtle turned his head to the side and read the clock.
1:00am.
Good thing he wasn’t scheduled for any training or missions till 3pm. That meant he could sleep in, thank heavens.
Somehow Karai had managed to convince her father to give the duo a ‘
break’.
They train hard, they’re the top students, but still teenagers who want an opportunity to
act
like it. And that managed to convince Shredder —- well, after her pleading with him for a straight 8 months.
Leonardo snickered at the memory and turned back to lay on his shell, wrapping his hands together as he slowly closed his eyes, ready to finally rest after such a long day.
Of course, his only other time of peace just
has
to be interrupted.
He heard the sound of footsteps rushing to his door, bursting it open and Leo quickly sat up, looking at the person in front of him with tired eyes, but he still smiled softly.
“Hey Karai.” He said.
The kunoichi smiled and closed the door, taking a seat beside Leo on his bed, resting her head on his shoulder. “Hey Leo.”
“Are you alright?”
She nodded. “Yeah, I'm good, I just can't sleep.”
“So… you thought it would be a good idea to make sure I can't sleep either?”
“You’ll be fine, you’re super energized with only four hours of sleep cause you’re a turtle so don't complain.”
He rolled his eyes. “Just because I only need four hours of sleep to feel rested doesn’t mean I don't want to get more.”
Karai frowned but nodded in understanding, “Alright, I'll leave you be then. You better make me breakfast when we get up though.” She stood up, brushing herself off and made her way to the door but Leo called out.
“Wait — you don’t have to leave. You can sleep in my room if you want.”
He had a king sized bed for a while now after giving Shredder a logical argument on why he should upgrade to a bigger bed. Whenever he thought of the situation out of context it made him laugh. He had to fight Shredder for 2 whole days because if he got a bigger bed… he needed a bigger room.
Which he got.
And he also got used to sharing that bed with Karai when she couldn’t sleep or wanted company. This was one of those moments.
“Thanks, Leo.” She smiled.
“You have to start just asking instead of me sending you off
then
saying you could stay.” Leo grinned.
Karai shrugged and got on the bed again, laying on the left side while Leo occupied the right, “Yeah, whatever. I didn’t even plan to stay with you. I'm just… scared I guess. Father said he had news tomorrow and I just — “ She paused, swallowing hard, “I hope it’s what I want it to be.”
Leo already knew not to ask what she was talking about, so instead he squeezed her hand gently. “You’ll be okay, Karai. Just try to get some sleep. I’ll make your favorite in the morning, alright?”
She smiled and reprecipitated the squeeze, covering her mouth as she yawned with her free hand, “Thanks, Leo. Goodnight.”
“Goodnight.” He whispered, letting go of her hand and pulling the blue covers over both of them.
The turtle reached over to turn off his lamp and then closed his eyes, slowly drifting off into a deep slumber.
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